The following relates to wireless communications, and in particular to techniques for aggregating communication links between devices. Wireless communications systems are widely deployed to provide various types of communication content such as voice, video, packet data, messaging, broadcast, and so on. These systems may be multiple-access systems capable of supporting communication with multiple users by sharing the available system resources (e.g., time, frequency, and power). A wireless network, for example a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), such as a Wi-Fi network (IEEE 802.11) may include an access point (AP) that may communicate with one or more stations (STAs) or mobile devices. The AP may be coupled to a network, such as the Internet, and enable a mobile device to communicate via the network (and/or communicate with other devices coupled to the access point). The STA may communicate with the AP or other devices via one or more channels or links, such as over a 2.4 GHz and/or a 5 GHz link.
When a mobile device is in close proximity to an AP, such as in the space of a home, it may communicate with the AP via a first channel, such as a 5 GHz channel. When the mobile moves farther away from the AP, it may be beneficial for the mobile station to communicate over a different channel, such as a 2.4 GHz channel, to provide better resilience to obstructions in the communication path, for example. In some techniques these channels can be aggregated to provide better throughput, reliability, etc.
However, current link aggregation techniques have drawbacks and reduced performance in certain scenarios. Some techniques, for example, may introduce delay in the process of splitting and assigning data packets to different sessions over different links. Furthermore, once data packets associated with different sessions are split over different links, the data packets may not be re-allocated to other links to account for failed reception, decreased link throughput or delay, and the like. These techniques generally require a group or package of data to be re-sent, and often times introduce delay between the time when a communication failure occurs, when the failure is detected, and when the data is re-transmitted. For example, where transmission control protocol (TCP) traffic is being carried over a link that fails, re-routing of the data may only occur at the TCP level, which may cause substantial delay before data is re-sent over the other link. As a result, there is a need to improve link aggregation techniques in WLANs, such as Wi-Fi networks.